Is America the free press's
last stand? It can feel that way when you look around the world.
English-speaking countries and Europe have traditionally been
relative bastions for independent media in a world where political
leaders have little tolerance for dissent, but Britain is on the
verge of adopting explicit state regulation of the press and the
European Union and Australia seem poised to follow. That's
especially frightening when you consider that many European nations
currently rank above the United States in terms of press
freedom—but their collective advantage could be wiped away in a
single legislative moment.The British press has, traditionally, been ... spunky. That
means that U.K. journalists put their U.S. counterparts to shame
when scrutinizing government officials and other public figures,
but that can also translate into a cavalier attitude toward the
boundaries of propriety when pursuing a story. Specifically, the
News of the World, an old and widely read newspaper and
part of Rupert Murdoch's press empire, was caught "phone
hacking"—breaking into private voicemail messages—with the
assistance of friendly police
officials. Looking for scoops, reporters gained easy access to
personal lives, including that of a murder victim, and military
personnel killed in action. In the fallout, the newspaper was shut
down. Nasty stuff, for sure, and seemingly settled by the closure
of a large publication, unless you have a coterie of offended
snooping victims, privacy-shy celebrities, and a
clacque of authoritarian radicals looking for an opening to
impose state control on the press. Those constituencies came
together in Hacked Off, a lobby group for press regulation. And
Hacked Off was able to leverage the scandal into an inquiry led by
Sir Brian
Henry Leveson, a jurist more than happy to deliver a recommendation that the
British government institute formal regulation of the press.That
regulation, the implementation of which is still under
hot and heavy debate in the U.K., would likely take the form of
a government body with the power to set standards for the press,
order the media to issue apologies and corrections, and impose
fines. Newspapers and magazines wouldn't be forced to
subject themselves to regulation, but those that opted out would
suffer escalated damages if they were sued for such matters as
libel or breach of privacy, and lost, in the government's
courts.Note that the U.K. is
already notorious for the ease with which prominent people, in
particular, can sue people who say inconvenient things about
them.As the U.K.-based Index on Censorship
warns:Britain being Britain, precipitating factors are required before
the country contemplates jettisoning hard-won liberties. The
European Union, on the other hand, just spits Orwelllian crap out,
seemingly on a whim. At least, there doesn't seem to be any
particular reason the European Commission's High-Level Group on
Media Freedom and Pluralism coughed up a report,
A Free and Pluralistic Media to Sustain European
Democracy, praising the free press as a necessity for
democratic nations—such a necessity, that is, that each member of
the European Union should have an independent media council,
empowered to maintain that freedom by upholding "European values"
and "the public function of the media."If you're scratching your head and wondering what "removal of
journalistic status" could possibly mean, you're not alone. But
"journalistic status" implies something formal that can be taken
away, which suggests permission from the state, which almost
certainly means occupational licensing. So, the European Union
apparently wants journalists to seek the nod to practice their
craft from the government officials they're supposed to
scrutinize.Rather more politely than might be necessary, the Index on
Censorship
points out:The European Commission move seemed to
catch Britain off-guard, which may have been deliberate. The
European report pointed to the fact that there was actual debate
over the Leveson recommendations as grounds for the EU to step in,
saying "this resistance by itself underscores the urgent need for
supervisory bodies that can and do act, instead of being
supervisory in name only."The High-Level Group on Media Freedom and Pluralism report is no
small matter considering how many nations are potentially affected
should its recommendations be implemented across the not-
quite-a-super-state. Even if you raise an eyebrow at Reporters Sans
Frontieres's ranking
(PDF) of the United States as 32nd in press freedom, it's difficult
to object to the group's observation
that "After a serious decline in civil liberties during the
eight-year Bush administration, Barack Obama’s election as
president raised many hopes that were quickly dashed." Notable,
also, is how many European Union members gain high ranks in RSF's
ratings: Finland, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark, Sweden,
Austria—all rank above the United States at present. It's
impossible to see even an EU-tilting organization continuing those
high marks under a regime like that proposed by European Commission
group with the improbable name, with government councils somehow
empowered to yank "journalistic status." That would be 27 countries
gathering up their media under state dominance, all at once.Even in the English-speaking world, the infection spreads. Last
year, Australia's
Finkelstein Inquiry actually beat Leveson to the punch,
recommending a "News Media Council" that would set standards for
the press and punish those who strayed from the fold. The
Finkelstein Inquiry, like the Leveson Inquiry, was nominally
inspired by the News of the World scandal. But
Finkelstein's team was a bit more open about the political
implications of its efforts. Referring to the "origins of the
inquiry," the report says:Note that The Australian and the Daily
Telegraph are both conservative-leaning newspapers, and a bit
of a thorn in the side for the current Labor government of that
country.Leveson's team may have been more discreet than Finkelstein's.
But parliamentary debate still rages hot and heavy in Britain. Meg
Hillier, a Labour MP (yes, Australia and Britain spell "labor"
differently), spilled the beans on the rush to censorship. Reports
the
Press Gazette:
The former junior minister told Press Gazette she does not
support the statutory underpinning being called for by her
party.
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